Back in June, as reported in The Morning Call, a former homeless shelter employee, Elisa Castillo, sued Community Action Center of the Lehigh Valley (CACLV). She contends her termination is a retaliation for reporting that Allentown's Sixth Street Shelter was padding the caseworker hours for one of its supervisors. What I've just discovered is that Castillo has an unlikely ally, the Lehigh County Controller.Before Castillo's lawsuit was filed, Lehigh County Controller Glenn Eckhart audited the Sixth Street Shelter to see if it had, in fact, inflated caseworker hours charged to Lehigh County in 2011. (You can find the audit here under General Reports for 2012, #12-03). Using four different tests, the Controller concludes that the caseworker hours submitted are "inconsistent" with the actual documented client contact.
That's a polite way of saying that Sixth Street Shelter, an arm of the CACLV, was padding its hours.
Eckhart's audit includes a strident response from the Sixth Street Shelter's Director, Marsha Eichelberger. She claims the County was actually under-billed, so there. She also takes a shot at Castillo, referring to her as a "disgruntled former employee who was terminated for just cause." She never bothers to address the finding that caseworker hours were submitted for one employee that were not actually worked.
Where I come from, that's called stealing.
Alan Jennings, CACLV's Executive Director, was a lot more conciliatory. "It's embarrassing," he told me. "I'll be the first to say it." Jennings added that his administrative costs are only 8% of CACLV's entire budget. He also offered to compensate Lehigh County.
Allentown's Controller passed on auditing the Sixth Street Shelter, by the way.
Jennings is obviously unable to discuss the lawsuit filed by Castillo, but questioned whether one had really been filed. "I haven't seen it," he told me, noting that CACLV has yet to be served.
The lawsuit, which has been filed, is below.
Whistleblower Complaint v. CACLV
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